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“Sure.” She made an apologetic face at Matteo as she did so.
“I was going to wait until you were back to tell you this—I was going to take you out to dinner and make a big fuss—but we were planning to offer you partnership in the new year.”
Cara gasped, and tears appeared instantaneously in her eyes. She felt like someone had punched her. “What? What are you saying?”
She had alarmed Matteo. Fair enough. She had alarmedherself. Matteo moved closer and laid his hand on her forearm. She started to wave him off, to assure him that all was well, but actually, that hand on her forearm was helping. Its warmth and weight were anchoring her, tethering her to reality when she felt like she was about to float away.
Reality where she needed to say something in response to the bomb Tonya had dropped. All she could manage was a weak “But... I thought that was quite a ways off.”
“You’ve been our top performer for years. Beyond that, you have all the qualities we look for: loyalty, judgment, leadership skills. And look what you uncovered!” Cara was trying to talk but making only vague squeaks, and Tonya laughed. “We can talk about it when you’re back in town. I only raise it because it’s relevant to the immediate circumstances. You can patch me into the meeting if you want, or you can handle it as you see fit.”
“Was this why you were using the worddickbagthe other day?”
“What?” Tonya sounded confused.
“You used the worddickbagseveral times. It seemed so... not like you.”
She cracked up. “Right. Yeah, we’re peers now. You’ll be vesting into the company. We can talk about dickbags all we like.”
“Does this mean I can travel less?”
“If you want to.”
“I...” Shethoughtshe wanted to. That’s what she’d always told everyone. That’s what she’d toldherself. After she made partner, she’d stop traveling so much, and she would do all the things. Buy the house. Have time for relationships.
Be still.
Aww, shit. Having the brass ring right there, so much sooner than she’d planned, was throwing her for a major loop.
“We can talk through details when you’re back,” Tonya was saying, and Cara worried that her internal freak-out was going to cause her to miss something important. She could freak out later.
“Right,” she said. “Right.”
“We’ve got meetings with lawyers all weekend, and they’ll advise on if and how we’re going to involve law enforcement. If you think you can hold off on updating the king, you might want to wait until I have more info for you.”
“Okay.” She was still squeaky. Her heart was hammering like she was climbing the hill to the palace at top speed. She cleared her throat. “Yes. Thank you so much, Tonya. I’m a bit overwhelmed with this news, but I’m thrilled.”
“Is everything all right?” Matteo asked when she hung up, concern etched across his features.
She looked at his hand. It was still on her arm. He looked at his hand, too. He didn’t move it.
“I’ve made partner.” She could still hardly believe it.
His face lit up. “That’s wonderful!”
And then, to her surprise, he hugged her.
Oh, shit. The tears that had been threatening were starting. She felt suddenly like a teenager again, reaching toward whatever was the next big thing: an A on a test, a summer job, a scholarship. Striving. Always striving. Always moving.
Now she could stop. She had what she’d always wanted. She’d thought she still had a good chunk of ladder to climb, but it turned out that she was already at the top rung.
Which made her cry?
No. She could not cry here, now, in front of Matteo. She needed to do something else, something that would forestall the crying.
“Congratulations,” Matteo murmured, his mouth in her hair near her ear, and he was doing the low-voice thing again.
Yes. Here it was. The thing that was the opposite of crying.
